


Loose Feathers and Angel Wings

by SatyrSyd37



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Wings, Fluff, Light Angst, M/M, Trans Akaashi Keiji
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-25
Updated: 2017-11-25
Packaged: 2019-02-06 15:01:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12820065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SatyrSyd37/pseuds/SatyrSyd37
Summary: “Who are you?”The boy's eyes go wide, pupils shrinking almost comically. He backs up into the couch, getting as far away from Akaashi as he can. “Hey hey hey let’s calm down a little!” he says, waving his hands in surrender. As he waves his hands, something moves behind his back. Feathers peak out, pale brown feathers streaked with dark streaks. The boy has wings.“Uh…oh!” He seems to realize that Akaashi is staring at his wings. “My name is Bokuto, and I, uh - I’m your guardian angel!”





	Loose Feathers and Angel Wings

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DeathandDespairQueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeathandDespairQueen/gifts).



> HEY HEY HEY NOAH HAP BIRTH!!! thank you for sending me posts and leaving super nice comments on all my works and being so supportive of my writing, it's really meant a lot to me so here i wrote you a thing!!! (sorry its so rushed and its poorly edited lmao)
> 
> enjoy and have a wonderful birthday!!!

Quiet. The evening was unusually quiet. There was no roar of tires from traffic, no shouting from their neighbors, no weird crashes from the lab down the street, no barking dogs, no hoo-ing of the owls that scavenged their street at night. Not even the whir of air conditioning provided any white noise.

Akaashi hates it. Everything had been quiet lately, too quiet, and it makes him want to scream.

 _Ding._ Akaashi jumps. The sound echoes through the house like a shout. Akaashi follows the smell of microwaveable meal into the kitchen and takes his dinner out of the microwave. He glances at the clock. 9:46. His mom said she would be home more than an hour ago, but that was fine. He would have been more surprised if she came home when she said she would.

He eats his dinner in silence, the only noise coming from the slurp of ramen and the clack of his chopsticks against the bowl. It’s unnerving. Should he turn on music? Or even a fan? Anything to cover up the oppressing, isolating silence.

_Screeeeeeeak click. Pat pat pat._

Akaashi freezes. Someone just came through the back door. No one ever came through the back door.

_Pat pat - thump._

Ignoring the pounding of his heart, Akaashi grabs the first thing he heavy thing sees, an unwashed wok sitting on the stove. He abandons his food and walks into the living room, holding the wok tight in his fist.

Should he call someone? He should probably call someone instead of handling this on his own, but he’s already up and he’s got a pan and he needs to figure out where that sound is coming from.

Akaashi tiptoes toward the living room, careful not to make a sound on the tiles. He grips the handle tighter and peeks around the wall.

There, sitting on the black leather couch, is a boy. He’s just...just sitting there, mouth slightly open, looking around like a child in a candy shop. Streaked hair flops in front of his face, nearly obscuring his golden yellow eyes. They dart around all around the room, looking up at the ceiling and to the left out the door and to the left at the fireplace and to the right at the painting of the bird and right at him.

_Shit._

“AHHHH!” the boy screams, the sound shaking Akaashi’s ear drums. He leaps up two feet in the air and falls back into the couch.

Now that he’s been found out, Akaashi jumps around the corner and stands in front of the boy, pointing the pan in his face.

“What are you doing here?” Akaashi demands. He swings the pan again and hopes he looks more intimidating than he feels. “Who are you?”

The boy's eyes go wide, pupils shrinking almost comically. He backs up into the couch, getting as far away from Akaashi as he can. “Hey hey hey let’s calm down a little!” he says, waving his hands in surrender. As he waves his hands, something moves behind his back. Feathers peak out, pale brown feathers streaked with dark streaks. Akaashi takes a step back as they grow and extend outward. The boy has wings.

Akaashi lowers the wok in shock. “ _What_ are you…?”

“Uh…oh!” He seems to realize that Akaashi’s staring at his wings. He stands up and extends them out. They’re enormous, wingtips touching either wall, entirely blocking the other side of the room. Deep brown stripes dash across big pale feathers, mottled with light brown and dark brown and grey and white. The boy points a thumb at his chest. “My name is Bokuto, and I - I’m your guardian angel!”

This is...too much. Just a minute ago he’d been complaining about the quiet and now his mind was screaming with enough thoughts to drown out any silence.

“Guardian...angel?”

Bokuto nods like a bobble head. “Yep, I’m here to, to protect you and stuff! From the bad things. Speaking of bad things, there will probably be some bad things knocking on your door like really soon, so you probably shouldn’t answer you door at all.”

“What.”

“Yeah, how about you show me your room?” Bokuto says. He leaps off the couch, floating down like - well, like an angel.  “We can get acquainted and - do you have any windows? Because if you do we should close those, and close the curtains or blinds or whatever. Because, uh, intimacy.”

Akaashi nods. He figures the best thing to do at this point is just go with it. As soon as Bokuto turns around, he can knock him out with the pan and figure out what the hell is going on.

But the moment Bokuto turns around, he flaps his wings and knocks half a dozen frames off the wall. They crash to the ground at the same time Bokuto lands halfway up the stairs.

“Oops.” Bokuto looks down at the frames dotting the stairs, brows twisted with guilt. “Sorry about that, uh…what was your name again?”

Akaashi follows him up the stairs, picking up and rehanging pictures as he goes. There’s one of his mom and dad on their wedding day, then one from Akaashi as a baby, wrapped in a pink blanket. His first day of preschool, back when his hair was long enough for pigtails. There’s one with his friends from middle school. All of them ended up going to a different high school. Akaashi hasn’t spoken to them in months.

“You’re my guardian angel, but you don’t know my name?” Akaashi asks. He supposed not knowing is better than deadnaming him. 

“Uh.” Bokuto just looks at him blankly. “We, uh, we guardian angels are only given a location, so, you know, they told me to come here and I did so here I am! And now that I’m here you can tell me your name, please?”

This situation is so absurd Akaashi wants to break out in laughter. Instead, he says, “Akaashi. Akaashi Keiji.”

“Nice to meet you, Akaashi,” Bokuto says with a bow. “Hey, I’ll race you up the stairs!"

Before Akaashi can agree, Bokuto bolts up the stairs and down the hallway. Akaashi follows a bit slower. A moment later, Bokuto comes sprinting back. “Which one’s your room?”

Akaashi reaches the top of the stairs, and Bokuto follows him as he pushes open the first door on the left. Bokuto pushes past him inside.  _This is weird._

“Whoa, your room is so...so empty!” Bokuto isn't wrong, but he could have said it more tactfully. On the left is a his futon, and on the right is his desk, perfectly neat and organized. The only decorations he has are two framed pictures on his desk, one of him and his parents, and the other of his volleyball team from last year. Maybe if he had more friends, there would be more pictures. 

_Knock knock knock._

Bokuto’s wings snap back to his sides and he freezes, still as a statue.

Akaashi could go back downstairs and answer the door. But his gut tells him he’d be putting Bokuto in danger. And despite the fact that Bokuto had broken into his home, and was evidently some freak of nature, Akaashi didn’t want him to have to suffer just because he was a little different.

_Knock knock knock._

Bokuto’s throat protrudes as he gulps. Akaashi takes a deep breath, puts a finger to his lips. He then tiptoes past Bokuto to silently closes his door. They wait a few minutes for the knocking to return, but the sound ceases.  

“I think it’s safe to talk now,” Akaashi says.

Bokuto collapses face first onto Akaashi’s bed. “Oh thank god,” he says. “Hey ‘Kaashi, uh, I had a long light down here from...guardian angel heaven, and I’m kind of tired, so would it be okay if I spent the night here? I’ll sleep on the floor, and I’ll be a good guest, I promise.”

Bokuto looks at him with wide eyes. Akaashi realized he missed his chance to knock Bokuto out a long time ago.

“Please please please please?”

_This isn’t just weird, it’s insane._

“Fine.” Akaashi pulls an extra blanket and pillow out of his closet. Bokuto curls up on them like a cat, and within minutes, he’s asleep.

Akaashi gets ready for bed, careful to step around the sleeping angel. He tucks himself into bed, and exhaustion catches up with him the moment his head hits the pillow. Bokuto’s snores aren’t the most pleasant thing in the world, but at least they’re more comforting than silence.

 

Sun peaks in through his blinds and gently wakes him up. He blinks his eyes open, and comes nose to nose with another face.

Akaashi scrambles backward. Bokuto lies on the very edge of the blanket Akaashi had set up for him last night, curled up in a tight ball. His wings sprawl out behind him, taking up most of the floor space in Akaashi’s room. They flutter slightly with the rise and fall of his chest.

Akaashi sits cross-legged on his bed, watching Bokuto as his heart starts to calm down. His eyebrows are knitted together, and his breathing is hurried.

“...m’not them…’ll get it, I promise…”

Akaashi flinches at the sound of Bokuto’s mumbling. But no, he’s not up yet - His eyes flicker slightly, but he doesn’t wake up. He’s just sleep talking.

With another mumble Akaashi can’t decipher, he rolls on his other side, wings flopping over with him. Akaashi barely has time to register what’s happening before a large, winged shadow arcs over his head. 

_...Shit._

The wings flop down on him and knock him over. He’s surrounded in a nest of feathers, sticking up his sleeves and down the collar of his shirt, in his nose, in his mouth. 

“Oh my gosh I’m so sorry!” Bokuto leaps up, freeing Akaashi from the feathery prison. As soon as they’re there, they’re gone.

Akaashi sits up and spits a few downy feathers out of his mouth.

“It won’t happen again I’m so sorry!”

“It’s...fine.”

The greater issue here was what to do with Bokuto now. Akaashi has school today. He doesn’t want to kick Bokuto out after what happened last night, but he doesn’t want to leave some stranger alone at his house, either.

“Hey ‘Kaashi, want me to walk to school with you?”

“Is it safe?” Akaashi asks. “What if other people see you?”

Bokuto shrugs. “They’ll just think we’re friends, probably.”

_That’s not what I meant._

It might be nice to walk to school with someone, though. All his teammates live in the opposite direction of him, and no one else is up this early in the morning, or that late after evening practice. “I suppose you could…”

Bokuto lets out a whoop. Akaashi hopes his parents aren’t home. And he hopes he’s not making the wrong decision by letting Bokuto come with him.

 

Bokuto’s arm bumps his as they walk to school.

“You’ll have to tell me all about guardian angels, now that you’re here,” Akaashi says.

Bokuto’s pupils go as wide as cherries. Then he blinks and laughs. “Yeah, yeah yeah of course, because. I’m a guardian angel so I definitely know all about being an angel and stuff.”

Akaashi bites back a grin.

“Does everyone get a guardian angel?”

Bokuto shakes his head. “Nope. Only special people like you.”

“Oh? And what makes me special?”

“Only the kindest, smartest, and courageous people get guardian angels!”

Akaashi doesn't feel very kind, or smart, or courageous, but he doesn't contradict Bokuto. “If I’m so perfect, why do I need a guardian angel?”

“Well, you see…” Bokuto rubs his hand along the back of his neck. Then he snaps his fingers. “I can’t tell you, actually! It’s your job to figure out why I’m here. And once you figure that out, that’s when I go away!”

“Is that so?”

“It is so, I swear!”

“I guess you’ll be here for awhile, because I have no idea why you’re here.”

“Oh thank god.”

 

 

Somehow, it becomes a routine. Bokuto walks Akaashi to school, disappears for a few hours, walks him back home, and spends the night there. For once, Akaashi is glad his parents are never home. A second teenager, one with wings, would be a lot harder to hide from them.

It’s different, having Bokuto around. The first few days were exhausting, between feeding him and talking with him and making sure he didn’t break anything. But once they slipped into a pattern, when Bokuto learned his way around the house and figured out how to microwave ramen himself, it was kind of nice. It was comforting to have someone to walk home with. He liked having another’s presence in the house. In a sense, Bokuto really was protecting him. He warded away the oppressive silence and lonely nights, and replaced it with laughter and warmth and feathers.

  

Bokuto’s wings lie sprawled across the couch like a blanket, curled up at the ends like fingers waving at him to come closer. Akaashi sits on the floor, hunched over the coffee table with his homework sprawled out before him. From here, they look thin; not as thin as paper, but much too thin to ever hold anything up.

Akaashi knows it’s probably rude, but he can’t deny his curiosity.

“Bokuto-san, can I touch your wings?”

Bokuto doesn’t look at him. Akaashi notices this because Bokuto is always looking at him, with unblinking yellow eyes, like an actual owl. Now, he stares at his feet. Did he overstep a boundary? They already slept in the same room and had seen each other undress. Perhaps it was a guardian angel thing.

Right when Akaashi’s sure he’s going to say no, Bokuto opens his mouth. Then closes it. And opens it again. “Um. Okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” Bokuto nods. “You’re my human. I trust you.”

Akaashi doesn’t know how he can already trust him when they’ve only known each other for a couple of weeks, but he doesn’t question it.

Bokuto pokes his wing out so that the tip just reaches Akaashi. He runs his hand over the top ridge of his wing, stroking the large brown primary feathers. Moving in closer, he tangles his fingers into the secondaries, across the stripes of brown across beige, and then even closer, through the softer auxiliary feathers by Bokuto’s side. “So this is what an angel’s wings feel like.”

Akaashi looks up and meets Bokuto’s eye. His cheeks are bright red. Bokuto looks away and gulps. Akaashi watches his throat bob as he swallows. “Yup. Yeah. Angel’s wings. Those are the kind of wings I have.”

“I thought they’d be softer.”

“‘Kaashi!”

 

“You’ve been eating a lot, Keiji.”

Akaashi stops chewing. His chopsticks hover above his bowl. “Yes.”

It’s the first time he’s seen his father in weeks, and he’s caught him in a lie. Hiding Bokuto from his parents hasn’t been easy. Even though Bokuto leaves during the day, at night when he comes back he’s always hungry, so Akaashi has been making a late dinner for two. Last week when his mom walked in on his room, and saw the two futons, Akaashi had to make up some excuse about how a friend had visited last night. Now he puts the extra futon away during the day, just in case.

Caring for Bokuto was like caring for a very large, very loud, and very feathery dog. But Akaashi had always been a dog person.

"Wonder what brought this on..." his father wonders. 

Akaashi keeps his head down, not daring to look his father in the eye. Was this it? Was this how his secret would finally be discovered? After everything he'd done to keep Bokuto a secret, would it end because of food?

“Finally going through that growth spurt, I see.”

Akaashi nearly sighs in relief. “Yes. I am growing...indeed.”

 

“Akaashiiiiiiiiii I need to stretch my wings!” Bokuto demands one day. 

Akaashi's having none of it. He tells Bokuto there's no way it's safe to go out in a public place with his wings out, but Bokuto whines and gives him puppy eyes and somehow Akaashi finds himself giving. 

And that's how they ended up at the park at midnight. 

He feels uncomfortable being out in public like this. What if someone saw them? What if they took pictures or reported them? Bokuto’s secret would be revealed to the world, and someone would probably come to take him away. Akaashi knows it's selfish but he doesn't want that to happen. 

They stand under a streetlight, shivering in the cold. “Aren’t you going to fly or something?” Akaashi asks.

Bokuto’s shoulders droop. “I...I uh. I actually can’t fly…”

“Oh.” What about those times when you fluttered around the house? Akaashi wants to ask him. But he supposes that’s not really flying. More like gliding.

That’s what Bokuto does now. He runs across the open field, wings trailing in a streamline behind him, then jumps up into the air and spreads his wings like a fan, gliding on them for several feet before tumbling to the ground. Akaashi watches from a bench as Bokuto runs - glides? - laps around the park. Sometimes he tries to flap his wings, but he never gets more than ten feet in the air before plunging back down. Akaashi wraps his arms around himself to try and combat the cold.

Eventually, Bokuto comes jogging back to him, glistening with sweat, feathers in his hair.

“Hey Akaashi, I was thinking before we go home we could - ”

“N-n-no.” After sitting out here for so long, Akaashi’s fingertips have turned purple. “We are g-going home _now_.”

Bokuto cocks his head. “Are you cold Akash?”

Instead of answer, Akaashi stands up and pushes past Bokuto. He’s going home, whether Bokuto wants to or not.

“Wait!” Bokuto jogs after him, and wraps a hand around his waist. Suddenly Akaashi feels a warm, heavy weight on his shoulders. Feathers brush his arms as Bokuto envelopes him under his wings like a mother hen. 

"Better?" Bokuto asks.

"...yeah," Akaashi mumbles. It feels like he put on a warm winter coat. "C'mon...let's go home."

Bokuto nods, and they head back to Akaashi's house, carefully watching for any passersby. His fingers lay against Akaashi's side, just under the bottom of his binder, and when Akaashi shivers this time, it’s not from the cold.

 

Akaashi sees him at the volleyball tournament - the outsider on the other team. He sits on the bench away from the rest of Nekoma, nose in a video game, face hidden in a forrest of bleached hair. If Bokuto were here, he would hound on the outsider immediately. Akaashi realized the Bokuto liked when people got along, he wanted everyone to find their place and fit in. Bokuto wouldn't be afraid to make friends. 

During a break, Akaashi sits down next to him. 

"What are you playing?" he asks.

For a moment, the outsider doesn't respond. Maybe Akaashi shouldn't have come over here, he shouldn't have started talking to a total stranger, he probably looks like an idiot now, this wasn't how you made friends, was it - 

"Final Haikyuu Quest," the outsider says at a whisper.

"Oh. I haven't played that before," Akaashi says. Akaashi breaks past the drawbridge that threatens to close his throat shut. "Can I watch?" he forces himself to ask.

"Sure."

The break is over quickly, but Akaashi sees the outsider at the next match, and this time, the other boy says hi to him first. He introduces himself as Kenma. Akaashi thinks he's made a new friend. 

 

Still sizzling loudly, Akaashi takes the plastic bowl out of the microwave.

“Hey 'kaashi? Why aren’t your parents ever home?”

He slams the bowl in front of Bokuto. “You’re my guardian angel, shouldn’t you know why?” Akaashi snaps. He immediately regrets it. When it comes to talking about his parents, he has a short fuse.

“I’m sorry,” Akaashi says. “They both work a lot. So they don’t have time for me. I know they’re busy but I - I wish they were...I don't know, more supportive...?”

"Oh." Bokuto pushes pieces of soggy pork around in his bowl. "That must be lonely."

Akaashi remembers the night, more than a month ago, now, that Bokuto had glided into his life. He remembers how lonely the silence had been before Bokuto came crashing in. 

"It sucks that they have to work all the time," Bokuto continues. "And it must be hard, having to care for yourself all alone. I mean, you're not even an adult yet!"

“Maybe that’s why you were sent here,” Akaashi says. “To look after me, since my parents don’t.”

Bokuto's wings drooping onto the ground. “Maybe…”

Akaashi shrugs. “I don’t know that for sure, though. So you can’t leave yet.”

Bokuto looks up and grins. “Nope, you’re still stuck with me!”

 

Sometimes Akaashi asks himself why he’s doing this. He’s sure that from an outside perspective, his decisions seem absurb. But the thing is, this whole situation is absurd. Akaashi is dealing with this in a rational way, or so he tells himself.

Why is he doing this? Sometimes Akaashi forgets, but then he sees Bokuto's smile and feels his hand in his and he remembers why. 

 

It’s one of those rare weekends when both his parents are home. Bokuto’s tucked away in his room, probably playing the new DS game he’d stolen from Kenma. Meanwhile, Akaashi’s stuck down here for a family dinner.

He pokes his stir fry, sliding a carrot slice around the edge of his bowl. 

_Knock knock knock._

“Keiji, go get the door,” his mom says.

Happy for an excuse to leave the table, Akaashi walks to the front door and opens it up.

There’s a boy about his age standing there, with straw colored hair hanging in his face. Around his shoulders is a big puffy white coat, which hardly seems appropriate for the late summer heat. Just over his shoulder on the other side of the street is a van labeled VOLAR LABORATORY. Something feels off about the situation, so Akaashi keeps his lips pursed tight.

“Hi,” the boy says. “My name is...Jack. I’m looking for my friend.”

Akaashi wants to shut the door in his face, but he’s afraid that would be suspicious. “A friend?”

“Yeah.” He looks bored. “I don’t have a picture, but he’s about this tall - ” Jack holds his hand a couple of inches higher than himself, “ - and he’s got weird hair that makes him look like a zebra. And golden brown eyes.”

“That’s an interesting appearance,” Akaashi says.

“Yeah. Should be pretty easy to spot. Have you seen him?”

Akaashi shakes his head. “I think I would remember someone like that.”

Jack snorts. “Yeah. Well, thanks anyway.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a card. A number scribbled in blue pen on the back. He hands it to Akaashi. “Let me know if you see him.”

Akaashi takes the card reluctantly. “Okay. Good luck finding him.”

Jack’s already walking away. He waves up a hand in thanks.

Akaashi closes the door behind him.

“Who was that?” his mom asks.

“Salesperson,” Akaashi says.

He flips the card over in his hand. On the front is a logo for VOLAR LABORATORY.

 

“Hey Akaashi, I have something to tell you…” Bokuto’s shoulders sway back and forth, wings drooping guiltily.

“What is it, Bokuto-san?”

“I’m not really a guardian angel.”

“I know," he says, not the slightest bit phased. 

Bokuto wraps a wing around himself, and starts playing with his primary feathers. “Yeah, I figured you would have realized by now. I’m not the best liar. But I felt bad about it anyway, so. I wanted to tell the truth.”

Now this is surprising. Akaashi thought of Bokuto as a loveable idiot, but if he knew Akaashi never believed his lie, and that he was a bad liar in the first place, he was much more self-aware and better at reading people than he thought. But even more surprising was that he had wanted to tell the truth.

“‘Kaashi? Please say something so that I know I didn’t mess up.”

“I’m just a little surprised,” Akaashi says. “It’s just...how did you know you could trust me? With the truth, I mean. I could just kick you out now.”

Bokuto cocks his head, an impish grin spreading across his lips. “That’s a trick question. You knew all along, so since you didn’t kick me out before, you’d have no reason to kick me out now.”

Akaashi fidgets with the hem of his shirt. “Then why tell me at all? I didn’t think...why did you tell me the truth?”

Bokuto looks up at the ceiling. “Well, I like you a lot, and I felt bad lying to someone I care about.”

He says it so plainly, like talking about the weather. _Today it is cold. I think it will rain tomorrow. I like you. I care about you._

Bokuto scooches closer to him. He sets a hand on his thigh and waves the other in his face, big golden eyes staring at him in concern. “Akaashi? Are you okay? Is it too hot? Cuz your face is really red.”

Akaashi slinks out from Bokuto and pushes himself off the bed. “I...am fine,” he says, even though he’s not fine at all.

 

Akaashi told him not to come. He told him it was dangerous, that he shouldn’t be here, but there he was in the stands, wearing one of Akaashi’s big winter coats in the height summer.

He’s waving down at the court to Akaashi. Akaashi glares it him. _I told you not to come!_ he tries to say with his eyes.

Bokuto ducks down, dejected.

_Good. That will teach you a lesson._

But Bokuto’s already here, and he’s watching, and Akaashi feels an extra pressure to do well. Bokuto thinks he’s a brilliant setter and Akaashi wants to live up to that.

Akaashi has never focused more on a game than this one. He refuses to even look at the stands until after the first set, knowing that if he caught Bokuto’s eye, the nerves of steel he built up would fail him.

They win the first set by a single point. Akaashi looks up into the stands - but Bokuto isn’t there.

Instinctively, he knows something’s wrong. He has to find Bokuto. 

“I’m sick and going to throw up,” he tells his coach. “Can I go to the nurse’s office?”

His coach’s eyes widen and then he nods rapidly. “Of course, how about you take Sarukui with - ”

“That won’t be necessary,” Akaashi says as he takes off in the other direction.  

He runs from the gym and into the main building, jogging through the hallways and peaking into classrooms. Thank god this is a home game, and Akaashi knows the campus. Where could Bokuto be? He couldn’t have disappeared that long ago, and where would he go? Akaashi can only think of one reason why he’d leave. That reason is written on the back of a business card tucked deep in Akaashi's sports bag. 

“ - orry, you know how they are.”

That voice - Akaashi recognizes that voice. He stops in front of the door to a classroom that's creaked open an inch. He tip toes closer and peers inside. It’s that kid, Jack, the one who’d knocked on his door the other day. And he’s -

“Please, Konoha, just this once, you know what they’ll do it they catch me!”

Akaashi yanks the door open races into the room. “Bokuto!”

Bokuto stands opposite of Jack, or whatever his name is, winter coat discarded on the floor, wings up and raised. Not-Jack, too, has pale brown wings sprouting from his back.

Bokuto's brows rise when Akaashi comes to his side. “Akaashi! But - your game - ”

“What’s going on?” Akaashi demands.

Not-Jack points at Bokuto. “This guy ran away from the lab and put us all in danger. What would you have done if you were discovered, Bo?”

“They were going to cut off my wings!” Bokuto cries. “Konoha, they said if they didn’t work they would cut them off and I didn’t want - I couldn’t let them do that!”

Konoha’s wings droop. “Wait...you still can’t fly?”

Bokuto doesn’t answer.

"Do you think...do you really think they'd cut your wings off?"

Silence. 

Konoha winces. “Sorry. I - I didn't know. They, uh, they’ve already surrounded the school.”

It only takes a moment for Akaashi to connect the dots - weird bird people, Volar Labs, the threat of becoming wingless. Bokuto's in danger. Glaring at Konoha, Akaashi grabs Bokuto's hand. “Come on, let’s go.”

“‘Kash - ”

“I said let’s go!”

They race out of the room and bound up the stairs, Akaashi dragging Bokuto behind him. Konoha doesn't follow, but they only make it to the second floor when the sound of footsteps pounds behind them.

“Oh no, oh no no no they’re catching up - ”

“Shut up and keep running!”

Akaashi ignores his screaming muscles as they fly up the stairs. They climb higher and higher until they reach the roof. Akaashi shoves him through the doorway and shuts the door behind them. They move a couple of stray boxes and bricks in front of the door to prevent anyone from getting through. 

Bokuto's eyes dart back and forth across the barren roof. "Wait, this is a dead end!" 

"No it's not." Akaashi grabs Bokuto's shoulders and looks him in the eye. "You have to fly us off."

Bokuto blinks at him owlishly. "Fly...?"

Akaashi nods. "Fly." 

He drags him ever to the edge of the building, ignoring Bokuto's protests. "Wait wait wait! I've never flown before and if I try now I'll probably fail and then we'll both die - "

_BAM!_

The lab's security must have caught up with them. Akaashi has no idea how long that door will hold. Which means this has to happen quickly. "You can do it. It's just like gliding." Akaashi points to the rooftop of the library the next building over. "See that? We're just gliding from up here to down there."

_BAM!_

Bokuto shakes his head furiously, tears are forming in his eyes and his face is blotching red. "I can't, I can't do it - "

"Yes you can! You have to!"

_SLAM!_

The door the rooftop burst open and a squad of people in black come rushing out.

Akaashi's tugged up by his armpits and before he can blink, he's falling off the building. His heart drops to his stomach as the ground gets closer and close. Akaashi squeezes his eyes shut. Is this the end? Was he wrong to place his faith in Bokuto?

_Snap!_

He stops falling. Supported by Bokuto's capable hands, he's lifted into the air, rising with the flap of Bokuto's wings. 

"Akaashi! 'kaashi I'm flying! I did it! I'm doing it!" Bokuto shouts. Akaashi can barely hear him with the wind whistles in his ears. He looks up. There are fireworks in Akaashi's stomach. Bokuto looks so majestic with the wind rustling his hair, wings spread wide and strong. He looks like he belongs in the sky. 

The library's rooftop comes up in an instant. Bokuto drops him to the ground first. Akaashi lands on his feet but tumbles over and rolls to a stop. He watches as Bokuto tries to land. He ends up tripping on the ground and somersaulting into a wall. Ever resilient, Bokuto immediately jumps back up feet and comes running toward Akaashi. 

"Oh my god oh my god are you okay?" He helps Akaashi to his feet, and Akaashi immediaely envelopes him in a hug.

"That was amazing," he says into Bokuto's neck. He can feel him shudder beneath him, whether from excitement or relief, Akaashi can't tell.

“So you _can_ fly!” 

They both whip around to the sound of the voice. There on the rooftop of the school are a half dozen people in back, Konoha, and a man in a tweed suit - the one who had just yelled to them. Going off his outfit and the look of disgust on Bokuto's face, Akaashi guesses he's the one in charge.

“You don’t have to keep running!" he shouts down to them. "We don’t have to clip your wings if you can fly!”

“No!” Bokuto yells back. "I'm not going to be a part of your stupid experiment anymore!" 

The man's face turns cherry red. "Bokuto Koutarou, get back here right now, or, or - " He whips around and points a finger at Konoha. "Go after him!"

Konoha looks back and forth between the man and Bokuto. Akaashi holds his breath as he waits for Konoha's answer.

He shakes his head no. 

The man in the suit fumes. He shouts some order at his team that Akaashi can't quite make it.

Akaashi turns back to his Bokuto "Bokuto, we need to - "

Two wide hands cradle his cheeks between them. Green eyes meet gold. Bokuto gives him the saddest smile Akaashi has ever seen. "I need to go, 'Kash." 

Tears prickle in his eyes. He knows that's the only rational choice, but Akaashi is selfish. He doesn't want to let Bokuto go. "But - but you were supposed to be my guardian angel - "

Bokuto laughs. "I think you were _my_ guardian angel this whole time."

He wants to tell Bokuto that he's wrong, that Bokuto really was his guardian angel, that it's because of him that he's friends with Kenma, it's because of him that he can stand living in his house, it's because of him that he has fallen in love. But the only things that comes out of his mouth is a sob.

Bokuto wipes the tears from his face with his thumbs, and kisses him on the cheek. His lips are soft and warm like a blanket too thick for the summer heat. He whispers in his ear, "I'll find you again."

Akaashi closes his eyes and nods. Hands drop from his face, leaving his cheeks cold. He hears a powerful whoosh. When he opens his eyes, Bokuto is gone.

 

He walks home alone after laboratory people have gone. He knows his coach will probably yell at him for missing the rest of the game, but Akaashi doesn't want to deal with him right now. He doesn't want to deal with anything at all. When he gets home, he goes into his room and slams the door, curling up on Bokuto's futon and laying there in silence. 

Silent. The house was silent. Not quiet, like the absence of sound, but silent, like the absence of life. It was the kind of silence that carved a hole in your gut and made your ears ring. It was the kind of silence that was a vacuum for all other sound, the kind of silence that the cacophony of a full orchestra symphony would be lost to. Who knew that the absence of another's breath could be so deafening?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

_Two years later_

Akaashi is unpacking the last of his boxes when he hears the crash. 

The transition into dorm life at college wasn't as daunting as Akaashi thought it might be. His roommate, on the other hand, he was a little worried about.

Akaashi marches into the living room, already dreading having to clean up whatever mess was there. "Kenma, what did you - "

He stops mid-sentence when he sees a pair of giant wings. Attached to them is a man laying on his back, streaked hair a mess from falling through the window, looking upside-down at Akaashi with bright, golden eyes. 

"I heard you needed a guardian angel?" he says. 

Akaashi isn't sure where to smack him or kiss him. He runs to Bokuto's side and decides to do both. 


End file.
